Cross-clade conservation of HIV type 1 Nef immunodominant regions recognized by CD8+ T cells of HIV type 1 CRF02_AG-infected Ivorian (West Africa).

Most HIV vaccine trials in the world are conducted with clade B while most circulating viral strains in Africa are non-B subtypes. We determined whether CD8+ T cells from HIV-1 intersubtype CRF02_AG-infected Ivorian individuals were able to recognize clade B epitopes. CD8+ T cell responses of nine HIV-1 intersubtype CRF02_AG-infected Ivorian patients and nine HIV-1 subtype B-infected French patients were studied using pools of HIV-1 clade B peptides (110 well-defined HIV CD8+ T cell epitopes) in an ELISPOT IFN-gamma assay. There was no difference in the number of recognized peptide pools between Ivorian and French cohorts (mean of four pools in both cases). Ivorian individuals had generated CD8+ T cell responses cross-reactive against HIV-1 subtype B and some individual peptides had been identified. Furthermore, sequence analysis of nef HIV genes of the Ivorian patients and nef cloning in two patients revealed very few variations between HIV- 1 intersubtype CRF02_AG and subtype B in nef immunodominant regions included in HIV clade B lipopeptide vaccines, currently tested in France.